1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to high speed data compression and to high speed data compression devices and systems.
2. Description of the Related Art
Prior to data storage, raw data may be encoded into a fewer number of bits for more efficient use of a storage medium. Upon retrieval the encoded data may be decoded to provide the original raw data. Similarly, prior to data transmission, raw data may be compressed for more efficient use of a transmission channel. Upon reception, the compressed data may be decompressed with a decoding process.
A number of compression techniques have been developed. Some compression techniques use lossless compression algorithms and other techniques use lossy compression algorithms. If no errors have occurred during storage or transmission, a lossless compression-decompression scheme provides the original data, while a lossy scheme may result in data similar to the original data but not necessarily the same. Some compression techniques encode data into fixed length segments, while others encode data into variable length segments. Some compression techniques involve the use of hashing, which minimizes the number of locations that need to be read and compared to find matching strings. Some compression techniques involve the use of shift registers with broadcast functions where the input character is compared to every location in the shift register in a single cycle. Some compression techniques involve the use of Content-Addressable memory (CAM), which compares the input character to every location in the memory in a single cycle.